As Normal as it Can Get
by JCBoLt
Summary: Four years later, and no one has yet recovered from the Loki incident. But when an old friend shows up at Stark Tower, what will become of our angsting band of heroes and our favorite young Mr. Rogers who just can't seem to ask just one simple question? Find out right here, right now! Rated T for death and slight undertones of depression. Sequel to Bring Your Kid to Work Day.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: Welcome back, guys! This is the sequel to BYK2WD. It's a lame-o title, but who cares. I'm keeping it. I'm even abbreviating it to ANaiCG. SO IT'S TOTALLY OFFICIAL. Welcome to the first chapter. There's a little time jump here- four years. And like I promised, this WHOLE story is going to be lighthearted and funny like TMoE&C. Except for the first part of this chapter. That part is angsty and is going to hurt your very soul. But afterward, we'll have Twilight references, constant Jake embarrassment, and a plot twist at the end of this chapter that everyone is obviously expecting. I love this story, and I love all of this, and I love the constant reviews, AND I LOVE ALL OF YOU! _FRIENDZONE_! Let me just tell you something. It is _so __hard_ to write sad stuff like this. I get this extreme pain in my chest and tears well up in my eyes, but I don't want to cry, because I'm not weak. So you should really appreciate this, because it hurts. This is a really painful chapter, and not a lot of it is dialogue, but hold out. Everything gets good at the end.**

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**ONWARD! DO NOT OWN!**

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It's been four years since everything went down, and we're all still trying to adjust. Derek is still trying to deal with the prosthetic arm that he took two years to build. It looks exactly like his suit and is actually pretty cool. The only thing it's missing is the thing in his palm- that laser shooter, or whatever it's called. But I know that he doesn't think that it's cool. It's no replacement for a real arm. And I'm certain that he wouldn't want anything more than to have real flesh and blood where cold metal now stands. I have to wrap my arm in an ACE Bandage every night because I overused it right after Chyle fixed it. It left it weak and I was stuck in physical therapy for a year and a half. The blow that Fen received caused him to go blind on one eye. One of his eyes is brilliant gold specked green and full of a passionate fire, and the other is pale blue, permanently dilated, and completely blank of emotion. Zach reverted back into absolute silence and he hasn't spoken since we got on the helicarrier and left Chyle behind. Nothing is really the same. And honestly, I'm not sure if it'll ever be.

We all could forget about what happened four years ago, but then we wake up at three in the morning in a cold sweat from the nightmares, and the scars are still there, and no matter what we do, Chyle is still gone, and the pain is still all too real. When I close my eyes at night, I can still hear Loki's laugh as the sharp metal of his scepter goes into my stomach.

I'll jolt out of bed and usually end up walking across the hallway and crawling into bed with Jake. It's gotten to be a permanent arrangement with him. I'll wake up in the morning after a bad nightmare, and Jake's arms will be around me, and I won't really have to worry.

I'm still waiting for Chyle to fulfill her promise. "_Hey, I'm a demigod. We're never _really _gone_." It's still clear in my head, exactly as she said it when I was just sixteen. I can see the smile on her face, how happy she looked to be saving us. But I can also remember how her voice shook slightly, and that was how I knew that she didn't want it to be that way. She didn't want an end like that. I wish I could have saved her from that. She was so selfless, so kind to strangers that she had just met. She was a hero.

I never truly understood what she meant when she said that. Was it a metaphor? Or was it something more? I don't know if I'll ever find out. Chyle left all of us on end with that one. She could have meant it like, "I'll always be with you all in spirit." Or, she could have meant it like, "I'm a demigod. This isn't the end." I hope that it's the second one. But if it is, I've halfway given up hope. She hasn't come back yet. She may never come back. But I do know that the first one is true. She's been with us all this time.

We found out that Chyle was Derek's cousin in the helicarrier. Apparently, her mom was Tony's sister, who married Loki, which bothered Loki so much that when he found out that Chyle was Loki's daughter, he stopped visiting her and his sister. But Chyle's mom passed away in a car accident, and Tony never got to see her again, which was really hard on him.

None of us went to college. We all finished high school, and then we were done. Everyone would always look at me weird, staring at the scars that go from my right wrist up to my elbow. Derek got the same kinds of looks for his sudden loss of… limb. I got so sick of it. And you don't need to go to college to be a crime fighter. You just need passion, courage, strength, and a purpose. And we have all of those. You don't need a college degree to save the world- twelve times now, actually.

But there's one thing that I can always count on. We'll always be a family. We'll always drag ourselves into the kitchen of Stark Tower at six in the morning, and we'll always eat breakfast together. Our parents will come down with us, and we'll joke around and have fun. It's one of the only times that we hear laughter around the Tower, and it's very refreshing. It bothers me that we're only 19-21 and three of us have already died- one of us twice. We act as old as our parents, now. I remember when we were younger, and to irritate Fen, we'd sing One Direction songs at the top of our lungs. But now, nothing is the same.

Sometimes I wish Chyle would have never saved me. She would still be here, and I wouldn't feel this pain. I remember that that was the first thing I realized when I faded away. _I don't feel any pain_. But now I feel that pain almost constantly. And I know that my family does, too. I can deal with my own pain, but I can't stand to see my little family of "Young Avengers" that I've kind of taken a mother-like roll in be in any sort of pain, ever.

A flash of lightning splits the dark sky in half as I stare out the window at the storm. I feel Jake's arm wrap around my shoulders and he sits down next to me.

"What're you thinking about?" I sigh.

"Everything." Jake nods knowingly and we fall silent, staring out of the window at the slowly growing storm. The wind speed is picking up rapidly, and the rain seems to be falling at an unnatural speed.

"Guys, why the long faces?" I'd know that voice _anywhere_, four years aged or not. "I told you I'd be back, didn't I?" I look over my shoulder and see Chyle standing in the doorway, wearing some really weird Asgardian armor. I run over and wrap my arms around her, and then punch her in the stomach, which makes my unwrapped arm throb with pain. She has far too much armor on. "Whoa, what was that for?"

"_Why would you DO that?!_" She raises an eyebrow at me.

"It takes a little while to fix a Rainbow Bridge that stretches from Asgard to Earth. I told you, Tory. I'd never really be gone." Jake walks over and hugs Chyle quickly.

"Are we the only people you've seen so far?" She nods.

"But I'd really like to see everyone else. Especially Zach." And for the first time in four years, I genuinely smile. Everything can change now. Everything can be fixed. Chyle is back. Everything can go back to normal.

Or at least as close as it can get.

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**A/N: That was so angsty. Be prepared for happy weirdness in the next chapter. Because I am sick and tired of the angst. LET'S GET ON WITH THE HAPPY.**

**-JC, the one who is really tired.**


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: CHAPTER 2! UPDATING TWICE IN ONE WEEK, WOOT! I'M SO PROUD OF MYSELF! Now, I know that there were only 2 reviews because everyone just didn't notice my story. BUT NOW YOU DO, SO REVIEW! Please? This one is happy… And you get introduced to the plot. The relationships that I've got in this story are Kyra/Derek, or Kerek, Tory/Jake, or Jary, and Chyle/Zach, or Zyle. Fen needs to get out more. He's all alone. He's just… Fen. I'll find an OC for him soon. Here, you guys can help by submitting your OFCs for Fen to date. Put in a paragraph long description along with a name. You will be credited. Send me these in the form of reviews.**

**ONWARD!**

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"J-Jake?" Jake turns over and opens his eyes, glancing at my shaking form in his doorway.

"Another nightmare?" I nod, wringing my hands together awkwardly to get them to stop shaking so uncontrollably. He grins, making him look a bit like the Cheshire Cat. All I can really see is his teeth. The bed creaks loudly as he scoots closer to the wall, giving me enough space to crawl under the covers and lay down next to him. He wraps his arms around my waist and I curl up comfortably, enjoying his warm embrace. "Good night, Tory."

It will be, for once. Chyle is back. Everyone took that pretty well, actually. Kyra hugged her tightly and Fen picked her up and spun her around. It's not often that you get to see your "dead" cousin after four years of her being… well… dead. Derek gave her an awkward side hug, trying to not freak her out with the mechanical arm, but she pulled him in to a full hug, grinning. Derek looked thrilled that she was unscathed by his prosthetic arm, unlike most everyone else he meets. Zach stood there awkwardly, twiddling his thumbs, and smiled at her widely. He obviously likes her, and she shares that feeling with him indefinitely.

"Good night, Jake…" I barely whisper, unable to keep my eyes open any longer. I am _so_ tired. I eventually fall asleep to the sound of his rhythmic heartbeat thundering right next to my ear.

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CHYLE'S POV

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I go into everyone's rooms at five in the morning, in accordance with what they asked me to do yesterday, to wake them up. I get hit in the face with a pillow the minute I walk into Derek's room.

"Go _away_, Chyle. I don't want to wake up," he grumbles, still half-asleep. I shrug and throw the pillow back at him with equal strength.

"You can get up, or I can get cold water." He scrambles out of bed and I grin at him, slamming the door behind me. I go to get Tory up next, but her room is void of human life. The only things that signal that she actually lives in this room are the bows hanging on the wall and the mess in the corner. She's not in here, though. I really have no idea where she could be. She's either already awake or she got kidnapped in her sleep. I highly doubt either of those could be true. So there's really only one other explanation. I open Jake's door as quietly as possible and immediately confirm my suspicions.

I clear my throat awkwardly and knock on the inside of the door. Tory groans and shifts in Jake's arms, which wakes him up.

"It's five o'clock," I explain. Jake nods and pats Tory's shoulder in an attempt to wake her up.

"Wake up, Tor." Aww, he even has a nickname for her, how cute. Tory groans again.

"No." Jake rips the blanket off of her and she buries her face in her pillow. "I'm cold now."

"That's the point," Jake says. "Get up."

"No," she whines, folding the pillow over her ears. Jake rolls his eyes and shoves her out of bed. "HEY!" She pushes herself into a sitting position and glares at him. "What was that for?"

"It's sort of time for you to get up," I say, shrugging innocently. She stands up and walks over to the door.

"I'm going to go get some coffee." She shoots Jake and me a sleepy grin and spins on her heel, stalking out of the room. Once she leaves, Jake checks to see if the door is shut, and then corners me.

"Chyle, I need your help with something." I raise an eyebrow at him. I'm not exactly the first person anyone comes to for advice- ever.

"What exactly do you need?" I'm kind of worried about what he's going to ask for. I haven't seen him in four years; I have no idea how much his personality has changed with the years that he's aged.

"Well, I just need some advice." I grimace. Again, I can't usually help with advice. My advice isn't great with anything. I couldn't give help on Asgard- I doubt that my advice would be helpful on Earth. "If you can't help, I guess I'll just get Kyra-"

"No, no, just let me try. What do you need advice for?" Let's just hope it's not for something like computers or any technology, because I can't remember anything about technology, and I'm not sure what has happened in the past four years, and-

"Can you help me ask Tory to marry me?"

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**A/N: There's your plot. I am so excited about this story! I'm gonna have so much fun torturing Jake, just like in the first few chapters of TMoE&C, which I am self-promoting. So again, I'm going to repeat my challenge for the reviews. But I'm too lazy to retype it, so I'm just going to copy and paste it. Oh, the joys of Microsoft Word.**

_Here, you guys can help by submitting your OFCs for Fen to date. Put in a paragraph long description along with a name. You will be credited. Send me these in the form of reviews._

**There you go. I don't really know how long this was, but I'm pretty satisfied with it. Thank you for reading, and please follow through with the review challenge.**

**-JC, the one who needs your help and writes short chapters.**


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N: SO I SEE THAT NONE OF YOU GUYS HAVE BEEN READING THIS. WELL, READ IT. NOW. THIS CHAPTER IS GOING TO BE LONG. LIKE REALLY LONG. LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOONG. It's in Chyle's POV, which I enjoy writing.**

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**ONWARD!**

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Wait, what? He wants to _marry_ Tory? Oh, this is just _perfect_. This is right in my ballpark. If there's one thing I know, it's definitely romance. Romance is my thing.

"Chyle, can you help me? I mean, whenever I try to ask, I get all sweaty and I can't do it."

"Is Tory really that intimidating? I mean, you guys are obviously, like, a super-couple. You shouldn't have that much trouble asking her to…" He glares at me and I shrug innocently. "What?"

"Have _you_ ever asked a very attractive person to marry you? It's as hard as trying to break into SHEILD. No one has _ever_ broken into SHEILD." His analogy is actually kind of hilarious. He's making it sound literally impossible to ask anyone to marry you. He's so _dramatic_.

"But people get engaged all the time."

"People don't get engaged to _Tory Barton_ all the time, though. I just get so nervous, and I can't do anything about it."

"So, I take it you've already bought her a ring?" He nods. "Okay, good, so we've got that part down. At least you aren't totally incompetent."

"HEY!" I laugh at his protests and continue on.

"And everyone knows that you're going to ask her?"

"Of _course_ not! They'd tell her!"

"Oh my God, guys, why are you yelling?" Tory sounds a bit more awake, now that she's got a mug of coffee in her hand. Jake blushes furiously and plays with the hem of his sweatpants.

"S-Sorry. Are… Are you wearing my shirt?"

"Maybe."

"You guys have to be, like, forty. Hold on, is that grey I see?" Tory's free hand shoots to her hair. She lifts up a handful to her eyes and examines it carefully. I laugh quietly to myself.

"Is my hair grey?" She asks Jake, looking thoroughly worried. Jake doesn't respond. He simply glares at me while I stifle my laughter.

"I'm just kidding, Tory," I assure her, still chuckling. She sighs in relief. I shoot another look at Jake and nod almost imperceptibly. He shoots me a grateful smile, and I head out of the room to let them get ready.

Of course I will help him. Those two are perfect for each other. I can't believe that he's having such a hard time with this, though. I would have thought that he would be completely on top of it with all sorts of romantic plans. Well, it just means that I get to do the romantic planning instead of him. Yay me!

With my mind whirling as I try to come up with some Jake/Tory worthy romantic plans, I head off to wake the others up. Kyra was easy, and she said that she would wake up Fen, so that just left Zack. I almost wish Kyra had said that she would take Zack and I would take Fen. I'm not entirely sure what to make of my feelings for this boy that I hardly know.

Determined to keep my mind focused on the two tasks ahead of me, I knock carefully on Zack's door in the hopes that he's already up and I don't need to go inside. But, of course, he's not awake. I open up the door and slip in, trying to think of something creative for getting him up. I flick on the lights and he instantly flinches, pulling the covers up over his head. "Come on, Zack. It's time to get up. Everyone's awake except you."

He pushes the covers off of his head so that he can look at me, or rather squint at me. I smile and he smiles groggily back. "Are you awake?" I ask, just to make sure he wasn't going to try and go back to sleep on me, kind of like Tory did. He nods and sits up to assure me that my fears are unfounded. "Okay, I'll see you at breakfast then. Don't be late!" I say the last part as I slip out of the door, my mind again turning to thoughts of Jake and Tory and how to help Jake overcome his fears.

When I'm headed to get breakfast, I catch a quick glimpse of Tory standing in the bathroom in front of the mirror, her hands raking through her hair. I nearly burst out laughing, running as quickly as I can into the kitchen before I die of laughter.

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JAKE'S POV

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"Tory, what are you doing?" Tory lets out a light gasp and turns around frantically. We're so close together that her face is basically in my chest. She looks up awkwardly with a sheepish grin.

"Nothing?" I raise an eyebrow at her and she shrugs.

"She was kidding, Tory."

"Can you check?" I sigh and brush my fingers through her hair. I come across a strand that's a bit lighter than the rest, so I inconspicuously yank it out. "OW! What the heck?"

"Well, now you don't have any grey hairs." She crosses her arms over her chest, giving me a death glare that gives her a sort of Mom-ish look. "What?"

"Jake, you're awful. Can we go eat now?"

"Of course." She leans up and kisses me quickly, to which I respond with a raised eyebrow. "What was that for?"She grins and shrugs.

"Good morning." I drape my arm around her waist and we walk into the kitchen, where Chyle is sitting with everyone else in a computer chair. She looks at me expectantly and I shoot her a glare, plopping down next to her. Tory sits in her chair, which is so conveniently next to mine.

"Did you ask her?" Chyle asks while the bacon is passed around the table.

"No."

"Why is she smiling so much, then?"

"I don't know, maybe because she's _happy_?" Tory grabs a handful of bacon and I raise an eyebrow at her again. "Settle down, carnivore." She rolls her eyes.

"I like bacon." I steal a piece off of her plate and she lets out a surprised squeak before smacking my hand. "That is _my_ bacon."

"What's yours is mine."

"Well, then, what's _yours _is also _mine_." She reaches over and steals two pieces of my bacon. "Gotta love those loopholes, eh, boyfriend?" She takes my hand in hers with a grin. I roll my eyes and try to ignore Derek's catcalls. "You're late," Tory says to her parents, who just walked in, both still looking rather tired.

"Well, sorry, Ms. Almighty Dictator," Clint says with a mocking bow.

"Oh, come on, Clint," Natasha says. Tory smiles at her for backing her up. "Don't you know that it's Mrs. Rogers now?" Tory's smile drops off of her face and she blushes bright red, wrenching her hand away from mine.

"Shut up," she mumbles awkwardly, looking down at her feet.

"So… We heard about your grey hair," Kyra says with a smirk. Tory's head immediately shoots up and she glares at Chyle.

"I took care of that. Just like how I'm going to take care of Chyle for telling everybody about that." Chyle cowers slightly, sliding down into her chair. "Yeah, you had better be scared."

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**A/N: THANKYOUARROWHEAD AAAAAAAUGSDSERLTSERIUTLHQT THANK YOU CHILD**

**Arrowhead1996 wrote from "I'm just kidding, Tory," to "Help Jake overcome his fears."**

**-JC, the one who had assistance this time**


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